Surface finishing



Dec. 5, 1967 D. THOMSEN ETAL SURFACE FINISHING Filed Feb. 17, 1965 INVENTORS M5 p 0% a #0 W 4 WW mNf /w/ United States Patent 3,355,760 SURFACE FINISHING Donald L. Thomsen and John R. Anderson, White Bear Lake, Minn, assignors to Minnesota Mining and Mannfactoring Company, St. Paul, Mind, a corporation of Delaware Filed Feb. 17, 1965, Ser. No. 433,330 6 Claims. (Cl. 15-246) ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE An adapter with telescoping parts attaches a stack of annular fibrous pads to a floor maintenance machine to permit simultaneous cleaning of baseboards.

This invention relates to surface treating equipment, especially floor maintenance machines. The invention is par ticularly concerned with a machine for simultaneously cleaning two surfaces which intersect at approximately right angles, such as a floor and baseboard.

Rotary machines for scrubbing and polishing floors have been widely used for several decades. In these machines a disc-shaped scrubbing or polishing element is driven at a speed of perhaps 200 rpm. by a motor which is mounted directly above it, the weight of the motor forcing the disc-shaped element into firm contact with the floor. Originally designed for rotary bristle brushes, these machines have become increasingly widely used with steel wool pads and, more recently, fibrous low density abrasive pads. Such pads are placed beneath and driven by, either the conventional brush or other specially designed discshaped driving elements.

All machines of the type just described have a tendency to throw soapy water, wax, or other floor maintenance material from the periphery of the pad. Although this does not cause any serious problem .on most of the floor, in areas where the floor intersects the wall, the centrifugally thrown cleaning solution tends to soil the baseboard. Prior to the present invention the most widely used device for cleaning baseboards (if they were cleaned at all) was a hand brush. Attempts have been made to devise small motor-driven tools for baseboard cleaning, but they tend to bounce irregularly away from the baseboard in use. Larger machines employing horizontally positioned cylindrical brushes, are more or less effective, but are hard to manuever. Other attempts have been made to modify conventional floor cleaning machines by adding either a belt driven rotary brush or a separate brush connected to the motor with a power take-oil? arrangement. Heretofore all such devices have proved either inconvenient, expensive, or ineffective, and have not been widely used.

A simple and convenient means has now been devised for converting a conventional floor maintenance machine into a baseboard scrubbing machine without impairing its ability to clean floors. The present invention comprises a simple adapter which permits the attachment of a stack of circular floor pads, having a total thickness equal to the height of the baseboard, and a diameter greater than the head of the floor surfacing machine to which they are attached. With this arrangement the peripheral portion of the floor pads may be used to clean a baseboard at the same time as the lower surface of the bottom pad cleans a floor. In order to make this device more versatile, the adapter is so arranged that it can be telescoped to the height of the narrowest baseboard which is likely to be encountered.

The invention is further illustrated ing drawings, in which like numbers in the several views and in which:

FIGURE 1 is an exploded view in perspective of the in the accompanyrefer to like parts 3,355,760 Patented Dec. 5, 1967 presently preferred embodiment of the invention, with certain portions cut away to facilitate understanding;

FIGURE 2 is a view in cross section of the device shown in FIGURE 1, illustrating the manner in which the adapter is attached to a disc-shaped driving element such as a conventional rotary floor brush, and the manner in which floor surfacing pads are held thereby;

FIGURE 3 is a view in perspective of an alternate telescoping arrangement for the adapter of this invention.

FIGURES 1 and 12 show a conventional floor surfacing brush having wooden back 11, bristles 12, and means 13 for attaching the brush to a conventional floor surfacing machine. The adapter made in accordance with this invention comprises first member 10 and second member 20, respectively having telescoping body portions 16 and 18. Base 14 of first member 10 is adapted to be attached to brush backing 11 with screws 15. Positioned centrally within body portion 16 of first member 10 is drilled and tapped post 17.

Second member 20 comprises flange 19 having depressed center 21, in the center of which is hole 22, in alignment with post 17. T bolt 25 is inserted through hole 22 and threaded into the drilled and tapped portion of hole 17 to the desired degree, thereby compressing pads 27 and holding them snugly gripped between flange 19 and bristles 12, washer 26 being slipped over the shaft of T-bolt 25 on the outer surface surrounding hole 22. In order to prevent second member 20 from contacting the floor during treating operations, it is desirable to tighten bolt 25 sufiiciently to compress the center portion of the lower pad 27 about /2 inch; depressed center 21 is sufiiciently deep that the head of T-bolt 25 does not protrude below flange 19.

Because rotation of pads 27 might. otherwise tend to rotate second member 20 and thereby either loosen or tighten T-bolt 25 (depending, of course, upon the direction of rotation and whether T-bolt 25' is provided with a left-or right-hand thread), means is provided to prevent or limit the rotation of member 10 and member 20 with respect to the other. This means comprises an eccentrically positioned axially aligned post 23 positioned within member 20 and integral therewith; Welded to post 17 at right angles to the axis thereof is bar 24. When parts 10 and 20 are telescoped, bar 24 contacts post 23 and limits the amount of relative rotation to considerably less than one revolution.

In operation the assembly shown in FIGURES 1 and 2 is connected to a conventional rotary floor surface machine, the number of pads 27 being selected to match the height of baseboard, and the device used in the conventional manner. Since pads 27 exceed the diameter of brush backing 11, the baseboards may be cleaned with the peripheral portions of pads 27 without hanging or bumping the upper portion of the wall. Simultaneously, of course, the floor may be cleaned in the conventional manner with the lowermost surface of the bottom pad; if desired, of course, the bottom pad may be different in construction from the others, so as to match the cleaning action to the surface being cleaned. Where the baseboard is coved, it may be desirable to have the lowest disc in the stack of pads 27 have either a correspondingly curved lower edge or to have this pad be somewhat smaller in diameter than those above it. Likewise, of ourse, pads may be selected to conform to ornate or irregularly shaped baseboards. Where it is desired to clean extremely narrow baseboards or even a base shoe, the upper pads may be of smaller diameter, functioning as spacers.

FIGURE 3 represents an alternate form of the invention which embraces certain simplications of construction. In this embodiment, telescoping members 30 and 40 correspond, respectively, to telescoping members 10 and 20 of FIGURES l and 2. Members 30 and 40, howaver, have a non-circular cross sectional configuration, hereby obviating the necessity of separate rotation-prelenting means. Member 30 comprises base 31 and hexag- Jnal body portion 32, while member 40 comprises flange 53 and hexagonally cross-sectioned tubular body portion 34. Flange 33 is a portion of a dish shaped end portion having depressed center 35, in the center of which is hole 36. Internally threaded post 37 is positioned centrally of body portion 32 in line with hole 36, the assembly being connected in the same manner illustrated in FIGURES 1 and 2. It will also be noted that in this embodiment the lower half of the telescoping assembly is larger (i.e., body portion 34 surrounds body portion 32), while the opposite arrangement was shown in FIGURES 1 and 2. This exact arrangement is not regarded as critical, although it is generally simpler to mount pads on a device which telescopes in the manner shown in FIGURES 1 and 2. Likewise, although the cross-sectional configuration of the FIGURE 3 embodiment conveniently and simply prevents rotation of the two halves of the assembly relative to each other, the non-circular configuration is somewhat less convenient to use with conventional pads having a circular center hole. It will be recognized that annular pads might have center holes of any desired shape to particularly accommodate the shape of the telescoping assembly.

What we claim is: I

1. An adapter for operatively attaching a plurality of annular fibrous pads of given inner diameter and outer diameter to a smaller diameter driving element having means for operative connection to a floor maintenance machine, whereby said machine becomes capable of cleaning baseboards with the peripheral portions of said pads, comprising in combination: a first member having a base adapted to be mounted in the central portion of the driving element on the lower face thereof and a body portion extending perpendicularly from said base, a second member having a pad-holding flange and a body portion extending perpendicularly from said flange, the diameter of said body portions being substantially the same as the inner diameter of said pads, means connecting said first and second members for holding said body portions in telescoped relation with a desired spacing between said flange and said base, and cooperative means on said members for limiting rotation of said members with respect to each other.

2. The adapter of claim 1 wherein the body portions of said first and second members are similar in cross section.

3. The adapter of claim 2 wherein the cross-sections are non-circular.

4. The adapter of claim 2 wherein the cross-sections are circular.

5. An adapter for operatively attaching a plurality of annular fibrous pads of given diameter to a smaller diameter driving element having means for operative connection to a floor maintenance machine, whereby said machine becomes capable of cleaning baseboards with the peripheral portions of said pads, comprising in combination: a first member having a base adapted to be mounted in the central portion of the lower face of the driving element and a hollow cylindrical body portion extending perpendicularly from said base, a second member having a dish-shaped depressed-center end portion with a padholding flange and a hollow cylindrical body portion of smaller diameter than said end portion extending perpendicularly from the depressed face thereof in telescoping relationship with the body portion of said first member, a hole in the center of said end portion, a first elongate threaded element mounted perpendicularly on the base of said first member and extending within the body portion of said first member so as to be aligned with said hole, a complementarily threaded elongate fastening element extending through said hole and engaging said first element, said fastening element having a head portion larger than said hole, and cooperative means on said members for limiting rotation of said members with respect to each other.

6. An adapter for operatively attaching a plurality of annular fibrous pads for given diameter to a smaller diameter driving element having means for operative connection to a floor maintenance machine, whereby said machine becomes capable of cleaning baseboards with the peripheral portions of said pads, comprising in combination: a first member having a base adapted to be mounted in the central portion of the lower face of the driving element, and a hollow cylindrical body portion extending perpendicularly from said base, a second member having a pad-holding flanged dish-shaped end portion and a hollow cylindrical body portion of smaller diameter than said end portion extending perpendicularly from the center of the depressed face thereof in telescoping relationship with the body portion of said first member, a hole in the center of said end portion, an internally threaded element mounted perpendicularly on the base of said first member and extending within the body portion of said first member so as to be aligned with said hole, an externally threaded elongate fastening element extending through said hole and engaging said internally threaded clement, said fastening element having a head portion larger than said hole, and cooperative means for restricting rotation of one of said members with respect to the other of'said members comprising a bar rigidly attached to the exterior of said internally threaded element and extending at right angles to the axis thereof, and an elongate bar-engaging element rigidly affixed to and extending from said end portion at right angles thereto within said second body portion.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,819,800 8/1931 Turner 15-23019 3,172,142 3/1965 Garth 15-246 FOREIGN PATENTS 75,804 5/1953 Denmark.

CHARLES A. WILLMUTH, Primary Examiner. L. G. MACHLIN, Assistant Examiner. 

1. AN ADAPTER FOR OPERATIVELY ATTACHING A PLURALITY OF ANNULAR FIBROUS PADS OF GIVEN INNER DIAMETER AND OUTER DIAMETER TO A SMALLER DIAMETER DRIVING ELEMENT HAVING MEANS FOR OEPRATIVE CONNECTION TO A FLOOR MAINTENANCE MACHINE, WHEREBY SAID MACHINE BECOMES CAPABLE OF CLEANING BASEBOARDS WITH THE PERIPHERAL PORTIONS OF SAID PADS, COMPRISING IN COMBINATION: A FIRST MEMBER HAVING A BASE ADAPTED TO BE MOUNTED IN THE CENTRAL PORTION OF THE DRIVING ELEMENT ON THE LOWER FACE THEREOF AND A BODY PORTION EXTENDING PERPENDICULARLY FROM SAID BASE, A SECOND MEMBER HAVING A PAD-HOLDING FLANGE AND A BODY PORTION EXTENDING PERPENDICULARLY FROM SAID FLANGE, THE DIAMETER OF SAID BODY PORTIONS BEING SUBSTANTIALLY THE SAME AS THE INNER DIAMETER OF SAID PADS, MEANS CONNECTING SAID FIRST AND SECOND MEMBERS FOR HOLDING SAID BODY PORTIONS IN TELESCOPED RELATION WITH A DESIRED SPACING BETWEEN SAID FLANGE AND SAID BASE, AND COOPERATIVE MEANS ON SAID MEMBERS FOR LIMITING ROTATION OF SAID MEMBERS WITH RESPECT TO EACH OTHER. 